1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an ink jet recording apparatus.
2. Description of the Related Art
In ink jet recording apparatuses, the number of recording elements in a recording head tends to increase to achieve higher resolution of a recorded image. In the ink jet recording apparatus that includes many recording elements, when all the recording elements are simultaneously driven, power consumption temporarily increases. Thus, the ink jet recording apparatus employs a block driving system for dividing each recording element into a plurality of blocks and driving the recording element by the blocks.
In the ink jet recording apparatus employing the block driving system, power consumption necessary for driving the recording elements can be made equal by shifting driving timings among the blocks. However, during recording, a positional relationship constantly changes between the recording head and a recording medium. Accordingly, when there is a difference in driving timing among the blocks, droplets discharged by blocks land on a recording medium in a shifted manner according to the difference. Thus, in the ink jet recording apparatus employing the block driving system, quality of an image formed on the recording medium may be reduced.
To solve such an issue, for example, Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2008-183742 discusses a method for counting the number of droplets (number of dots) to be discharged by each block based on recoded data, and changing a driving order so that a driving timing of a block having a large number of dots can be shorter.
A recent ink jet recording apparatus has been used for industrial and commercial printing. In these fields, throughput faster than a household ink jet recording apparatus is required.
In the ink jet recording apparatus designed to achieve high-speed throughput, moving speeds of the recording head and the recording medium relative to each other are higher. Even when the method discussed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2008-183742 is used, a length of the recording medium conveyed before completion of recording of one column is larger, consequently widening an area of one column on the recording medium. Thus, there is a possibility that image quality of a thin line or a character including the thin line formed in a recording direction or a direction vertical to the recording direction may be deteriorated.